Chicken Soup by Linds

Well this soup was sure a good way to dive right in! I made mine on Saturday, and it was perfect because I had a lot of time, Kenny was home, and it was very rainy and cloudy all day which is perfect for soup days.

This picture should have had the whole chicken in one hand, and a parsnip in the other, because those were the two "new" things for me. I have never bought and cut a whole chicken, nor have I ever bought and eaten a parsnip. But after going to 2 grocery stores and one farmer's market just to look for the parsnip, we just don't have any here yet. They all told me to look later in the fall. I also love my new apron.

A word about the chicken: MESSY! It was so gross to me. I do not enjoy snapping bones with my bare hands, sawing away at lifeless birds with my dull knives, pulling out their innerds (ok so I actually made Kenny pull them out for me), and I really didn't like when I saw multiple white sticks protruding from the tail. They were feathers!! I have since learned that you can buy whole chickens with all the stuff already bagged, like I've seen in turkeys. I will have to get that next time. If there is a next time; really I don't know if it's worth all the work. they are much cheaper then buying pre-packaged boneless, skinless, chicken breasts, but it takes about half the time. It was a good experience, really it was. I'm glad I was able to do it, even if only once. I ended up adding noodles to mine because we like noodles in chicken soup. And I didn't let the vegetables cook long enough, so they were a little crunchy. But Kenny told me that he prefers it that way because he likes to have a little crunch to his soup, so I was glad. Mine turned out a little bland. But that might have been because I added another cup and a half of water at the end, because I was worried I wouldn't have enough broth when I put the noodles in. But we just put in some salt (and cheese and crackers) and it was really yummy. It sure made our noses run a lot...in case you wanted to know.

There's the final product, minus the parsnips and plus the noodles. we thought it tasted really good, but not like overly good that I think it was worth all the work. Will I ever do this again? Really, I don't know. I'm not like totally against it, but I tend to do things the fastest way. I'm excited for the next challenge!!